Wall Street Journal Wolf to its Little Piggies: Trust Me

Sigh. Once again, the Wall Street Journal has published a nonsense op-ed that has the climate denialosphere all in a tizzy. The author of the op-ed, Matt Ridley, tries to convince us that global warming won’t be so bad. The track record of correct climate science in WSJ op-eds leaves much to be desired. In Wall Street Journal: Selectively Pro-Science, I showed that WSJ op-eds fail to properly inform 93% of the time. In another study, The Union of Concerned Scientists found that WSJ op-eds mislead 81% of the time.

Matt Ridley bases his left field claim on the “expertise” of Nicholas Lewis who Ridley claims is “A semiretired successful financier from Bath, England, with a strong mathematics and physics background, Mr. Lewis has made significant contributions to the subject of climate change.” Using two journal database search tools, I could only locate one paper from Lewis. Just one. I guess WSJ and Ridley think Lewis’ one peer-reviewed science paper qualifies as “significant contributions to the subject of climate change” and he is qualified to overturn the many thousands of experts (including health officials, military officials, and insurers) who are very concerned about the expected planetary warming.

Here is what well-published climate scientists have been telling us for more than a decade:

Global warming will increase the frequency and severity of heat waves

Global warming will increase the frequency and severity of fires

Global warming will increase the frequency and severity of drought

Global warming will increase the frequency and severity of floods

Global warming will increase ocean acidification thus jeopardizing the entire marine food chain from which millions and millions rely on

Global warming will increase the frequency and severity of coral bleaching

Global warming will increase global sea level

We are just at the very beginning stages of the global warming that is expected to come, yet, anybody with two eyes in his head can see the results of even this “modest” level of warming in the past few years:

WSJ: Not so bad (Image: CNN)

WSJ: Not so bad (Photo: Susannah Kay)

WSJ: Not so bad (Photo: Scott Olson)

WSJ: Not so bad (Photo: Mark Dye)

WSJ: Not so bad (Image: Ocean Champions)

WSJ: Not so bad (Image: Skeptical Science)

WSJ: Not so bad (Photo: Nick Cope)

All this from just a “modest warming” in the previous few decades. Imagine what images you will see if the expected warming (much, much more) by the year 2100 actually happens? The WSJ is supposed to be providing accurate financial advice to its subscribers, and in many cases it does. When it comes to climate change and the massive associated costs and human suffering a rapidly warming world brings with it, WSJ is misinforming its readers which is already costing them dearly. How many more billions will subscribers shell out in climate-related losses before they realize they are being duped by WSJ?

Mark M, so what? Who predicted an everlasting drought in this case (ans: nobody) – how long did this one last, and was it significantly longer than average?

Climate does not respond instantaneously to CO2 increase – we have had a rise (globally) of 0.6C in 30 years, with another 1C to come by mid-century. This rise is “locked in” and will happen even if we stopped emitting CO2 in the morning.

This proves that rising CO2 was not the trigger that caused the initial warming at the end of these ice ages – but no climate scientist has ever made this claim. It certainly does not challenge the idea that more CO2 heats the planet.

No-one disagrees CO2 contributes a warmth & balance to our climatic processes.
It is the extent of man made CO2 that causes catastrophic weather in the distant future, and only a energy tax can stop this ‘warming’, that is questioned.

Which leads us back to my initial question to Prof. Mandia, leader of the Climate Response Team regarding the end of drought in Australia.

One look at his bolded 7 points above and nowhere does it portend the end of droughts. Anywhere.

Handjive, you are attacking a strawman. No one says that “only a energy tax can stop this ‘warming’”. Climatologists say that only reducing/stopping CO2 accumulation into the atmosphere will stop the current warming (although, unless we actually reduce it, it will actually still continue for a few decades). Economists have offered a carbon tax (not an energy tax) as a possible way to get consumers to alter their consumption pattern.

Also, the key quote from David Jones is “There is a debate in the climate community, after … close to 12 years of drought, whether this is something permanent. Certainly, in terms of temperature, that seems to be our reality, and that there is no turning back.”
He does NOT claim anywhere that the rainfall deficit is permanent. This is merely your interpretation based on the framing of the reporter.

Reading and understanding what is written can be difficult. It gets even more difficult when you are ideologically inclined to reject the message…

Thanks for your time & response to my question about Australia’s drought free climate and why it was never predicted amongst claims of “more drought”. By Anyone.

In Australia, we have the highest carbon (sic) tax in the world, ($23 a tonne) designed to stop the world from warming.
So, I am not “attacking strawmen” , I am “living the experience”, paying & preparing for perfect weather, which, I am assured by Australia’s premier science body, the CSIRO, ONLY an energy tax, or a “weather tax” if you prefer, is all that is required:

❝ Climatologists say that only reducing/stopping CO2 accumulation into the atmosphere will stop the current warming (although, unless we actually reduce it, it will actually still continue for a few decades). ❞

In Australia, Palaeontologist and chief climate scientist Guru Tim Flannery says 1000 years, even if we stop ALL emissions, NOW!

Flannery, the leader of our Climate Commission is not very scientific, climate or otherwise:

.

❝ He does NOT claim anywhere that the rainfall deficit is permanent. ❞

“Rainfall deficit”. Fancy words for drought.

Quote Jones:
“IT MAY be time to stop describing south-eastern Australia as gripped by drought and instead accept the extreme dry as permanent, one of the nation’s most senior weather experts warned yesterday.”

❝ Reading and understanding what is written can be difficult. It gets even more difficult when you are ideologically inclined to reject the message…❞ Quite so.

The quote, “There is debate in the climate community…” is a surprise as well, as we know “the debate is over.”
If there is any “debate’, It would be an echo chamber, as no dissent is allowed.
.
So, after a round of unicorn hunting, Australia is Officially Drought Free, and we have no explanation how this is possible in a world where:

❝ #3. Global warming will increase the frequency and severity of drought ❞

Urgh, the stupid, it burns! Handjive, how can I help someone who does not want to be helped? It is obvious you do not want to be helped by your diatribe, claiming amongst others that CSIRO says an energy tax will provide “perfect weather”, with as reference a newspaper article that solely discusses the impact of an energy tax on consumer prices.

I asked originally if anyone, especially the author of this blog, if they could explain how Australia, the ‘canary in the coal mine’, as Joe Romm said, is OFFICIALLY DROUGHT FREE, despite claims that more & extreme drought was expected by “climate experts”. (see article point 3 above [bolded] & my first link above)

Your concept of “help” Marco, does not ‘help’ explain how Australia is drought free.

In Australia, we are told by the govt. funded CSIRO, in conjunction with the govt. funded BoM & Climate Commission, if we don’t pay this carbon (sic) tax, cities will be wiped off the map, and droughts will become more extreme and permanent.

A few nights ago my homeward bicycle commute was through snow. I felt pleased that my low income, low carbon lifestyle was helping keep the planet cool enough to permit snow to fall. It’s a bid sad to read so many articles and posts about government delays in implementing carbon taxes. I’ve taken the initiative to make it possible for folks with high carbon lifestyles to offset their carbon emissions and voluntarily raise the price of their carbon today. I’m trying to share as many bicycle-lifestyle-centric tips as I can. Raising the price of carbon at the grassroots level, in a sensible way, is just one little step I feel can be taken to save the planet.

If I recall correctly there are many parts of Australia that are not currently in drought. I notice that the repeated proclamations of “drought free” make no mention of Australia being either “flood free” or “fire free”. I wonder why that is.

We don’t expect ever to be free of any of these events anyway. But do we expect them to be the same as they are now, more like they were 40+ years ago, or to get more frequent or more severe … or both?

I’m a bit late to this party, but I can’t help noticing that the constant cries of we’re OK, we’re drought free, were streaming forth as 40+ fires burned 1000s of hectares in Tasmania. Leaves a bit of a nasty taste in my mouth. It’s one thing to “believe” you’re right about something. It’s another thing entirely to ignore the desperate visions of an extreme climate event coming at you day after day while you propound those beliefs.

And we need to remind ourselves that is is not just climate scientists tell us that the world is warming due to massive emissions of heat-trapping gases and that warming is dangerous to society and nature. Medical experts agree that climate change is increasing our health-related illnesses. Military and intelligence experts consider climate change a grave national security threat. The re-insurance industry tells us that extreme weather events influenced by climate change are already costing us dearly. And of course, our own eyes tell us that the climate is not what it used to be and we are all feeling its painful effects already.